Wednesday, September 5th, 2007
06:30 My Boys
08:00 Seinfeld
08:30 Journeyman
10:30 The Closer
11:30 Damages
12:30 State Of Mind
The 14th episode of My Boys picks up the action six months after the events of #13. We learn that PJ and Brendan didn't progress anywhere after their kiss, and now they are back to the way things were before. Except that - occasionally - you could cut the tension between them with a knife. My Boys has a lot of strengths, and one of them is ability to capture real-life scenarios and play them out in a believable way. Oh, and make it hysterically funny.
The second last episode of Seinfeld's season seven is the closest I've seen them come to an episode of It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia, which leads me to suppose that this episode - more than almost any other - might serve as the template for Always Sunny? One major plot revolves around the break-up of a marriage: George idadvertantly caused the split, and Jerry & Eleaine are over-joyed. So happy, in fact, that they team up to pick off he newly single couple as fast as possible!
The first episode of Journeyman introduces us to a time-travelling hero who - in this story - is drawn repeatedly into the life of a man who is attempting suicide because of a broken heart. Over the course of this first adventure, our hero learns a lot about his jaunts in time, as well as trying to piece together the life story of the man he keeps popping up beside. It comes off as a more serious, more dark, version of Quantum Leap and I'll certainly watch a second episode.
The Closer always starts off with a prolonged crime-scene scene. Often these seem to take up a quarter of the episode, and are very engrossing to watch. When the show deviates from this formula, you know you are in for something special. Picking up from the previous week's climax, Brenda has been instructed to take time off from Homicide and recover. She is assigned to baby-sit a TV camera crew. However, the humourous tone of the opening scenes disappears a few minutes in, with a hail of gunfire (possibly aimed at Brenda).
This potential hit on her life co-incides with a visit from her parents and the episode skillfully weaves the two narratives together to give us an unusual and hilarious hour of TV, that feels nothing like a typical episode of The Closer. Having said that, it must be said that The Closer is now so adept at changing tone-of-story from week to week that it's hard to say anymore what a 'typical' episode would be like. The Closer: A show at the top of it's game. Best bit? Brenda, her fiancé, her mum, her dad, and two SWAT guys sprawled around a big bed watching video-tapes connected to the case.
I arrived at the third episode of Damages this evening. Patti was the victim of apparent death threats in this one (a hand grenade was posted to her office) while she faced a crisis on the home front (her porn-addicted teenage son is facing expulsion from school). All the while, behind the scenes, Patti continues to manipulate the life of her new associate Ellen. It's good stuff, but sandwiched between The Closer & State Of Mind it comes up short in the entertainment-value department. Only three episodes in and I'm losting interest to a certain degree. All this character development is great and all, but if you don't care about the characters very much, you can't enjoy the show.
Caring about the characters is not a problem with State Of Mind. "Helper Helpypants" is the fabulous title for the 5th episode. For once, Anne Bellows doesn't have a plot-line, and the episode is largely devoted to an evening spent at Taj's house. It's a ritual everyone in the practice endures ever few months, and it's Taj's turn to host dinner. It's a stressfull dinner. Anne and James don't like Taj, Cordelia is secretly having an affair with him, and Taj - himself - treats his wife and daughters in a cold business-like manner that annoys/upsets everyone. Particularly Anne, the 'Helper Helpypants" of the title.
What's to say? In 5 episodes the cast/writers have given us a bunch of characters we really care about, and a collection of stories with rather down-beat realistic endings. Taj isn't the nicest of guys, but he's not just a 'TV jerk'. He comes across as a very real person whose choices we don't like. The episode ends with a real "Pow!" moment. It reminds me of the scene that marked the end of Ann's marriage, back in episode one. No histrionics, lots of genuine emotion in a few well-chosen words.
Best bit? Lili Taylor dressed as the superhero "Helper Helpypants". I'm so smitted with Taylor at this stage it's not even funny. She attacks all the fantasy sequences with an unabated joy that is impossible to resist.
Best TV of the night? Even with The Closer and State Of Mind being top of their game tonight, they couldn't catch My Boys.
My Boys, Seinfeld, Journeyman, The Closer, Damages, State Of Mind
